out of the mouths of babes (oft comes gems)
by ShadowSpires
Summary: Nightwing has been running himself into the ground between Bludhaven and the Titans. He's going to get himself killed.


Set shortly before Titans V. 1 #10-12. Mostly.

Written for the 2014 DCU Fic Hunt.

Nightwing swung onto the roof of the apartment building halfway down 7th street and stumbled badly on the landing. His vision swam before him for a moment and he teetered for a second on the edge, trying desperately to recover his balance. He failed, and tipped abruptly backwards off the roof.

The twist he managed mid-fall was lacking all of his usual grace, but he managed to get gloved fingertips around the railing of the rusting fire-escape. The metal was old and rotting away, like the rest of Bludhaven, and it screeched under the added weight, but it held. Nightwing gave himself a bare moment to hang there, mind blank, before he swung himself in to the landing below him.

His left knee buckled on impact.

He tried to recover, but he botched that too, ending up on his knees on rusting metal, clinging to the railing. He'd taken a bad kick to it almost two weeks ago; zigged when he should have zagged. It should be better, but it just wasn't healing.

"Well," Dick whispered to himself, falling silent for lack of anything else to say, reeling from the close call. It wasn't the first time he'd been fingertips from a messy death. It wasn't even the first time it had been his own stupid fault, rather than villians attacking or criminals shooting at him, but it was one more indication that he was slipping, failing.

He slowly tilted his head to rest on his hands where they clung to the railing, hoping against hope that his dramatic entrance hadn't woken the occupants of the whole building, and that he would have a few minutes before someone came out the window brandishing a gun.

In this apartment building Matt Carson in 84b had a licensed 9mm, and Alina Thomson in 312 had a 22. That meant there were probably at least 30 unregistered firearms in the building of varying caliber. Not counting the 3 registered and likely similar number of unregistered firearms within spitting distance in the next building.

Dick didn't know who's landing he was on. How likely they were to have a gun, or a knife, or bestir themselves for loud noises outside their window in the middle of the night as opposed to huddling in their beds and hoping it would go away. He was just too tired to care. All he really wanted was a few minutes where no one was shooting at him, and if that respite came on a rusting fire escape in the residential district then so be it. Respite from the overwhelming responsibilities, and the hell of Bludhaven, and the creeping, itching feeling he'd had all night that someone was watching him, even though every time he looked no one was.

The drug deal he had been on his way to interrupt wasn't for another hour anyway. He had been planning to be there early enough to stake the place out, but now he would just have to improvise. He was good at that, normally, but now he felt drained of inspiration. Every move felt heavy, every step an effort.

He was exhausted. He'd gotten back from the Titans only a half hour before. The time spent there, not to mention the hour drive each way, was cutting dangerously into his already limited patrol time between getting off work as Officer Grayson and sunrise, when he stumbled back into his apartment for an hour or so of sleep before his alarm woke him in time to get to the station.

Dick hated winter in Bludhaven. It was cold and grimy, the desperation and filth almost starker against the biting chill than in the rotting heat of summer. Nothing like the snow-dusted grounds of the manor. And the nights got longer and longer; longer each day until light kisses the horizon and Dick could call it a night without feeling like he was shirking responsibility to the city he had claimed.

He used to love the long nights of winter. Playing in the rooftops with Babs, acting up to get that little crack of a smile from Bruce, taking Jason and then Tim train surfing. But now Barbara was locked in her tower and Bruce never smiled anymore. Jason was gone, dead and buried all alone, his poor little brother. Tim had a team of his own, and seemed to be doing well when he was with them, but was more and more falling into grim silence when in Gotham.

Not that Dick had made it to Gotham in a while to check up on them in person, but Tim at least he spoke to on the phone every week or so. In that hour he should be sleeping, but they were both just getting in from patrol, chatting to the tune of dismantling body-armour. It was the only time he had, and he'd be damned if he let Tim slip away from him like Jason had, like so many things in his life had, or were in the process of doing.

He knew that Wally thought he worked too hard, was getting too grim, too much like Batman, but he wasn't sure adding the Titans back into that mix had been the best option. He had missed them all desperately, yes, despite the petty annoyances and remembered grievances that were helping make this start of the Titans so rocky. Jesse had been right when she had called them incestous.

They had grown up together, fought together, loved together, even fought each other sometimes. But they had all grown up, now. Grown apart in many ways, no matter how much that hurt and they were desperately trying to deny it; fighting to make each other fit into the molds they remembered. It wasn't going to work, stuffing the others into the remembrances of the children they had been, but Dick didn't know how to stop himself, let alone fix it in anyone else.

He didn't know how to fix the Titans, he couldn't fix Babs - didn't want to, just wanted her to let him in, he still loved her, likely always would, even if they weren't right for each other anymore either.  
>He'd never been able to fix Bruce, and had spent most of his childhood denying that truth.<p>

He hadn't been able to fix Jason, or his relationship with Kory, or the mess that was his personal life. He hadn't been able to fix Roy, who had thankfully managed it anyway, and had given their circle Lian, the brightest little light any of them could have asked for.

Dick closed his eyes, and listened to the sounds of his city. He couldn't fix Bludhaven either, one more failure in a list of them, a life of them.

The slide of a window opening startled him out of his daze, and Nightwing tensed to move in any direction depending on the threat that came through the window. He was in a bad position to dodge a bullet, and in no shape to fight. He'd have to go over the edge again, and hope he could catch himself. He was always catching himself these days; no one there to do it for him.

Dick found himself blinking in bemusement when that threat resolved itself into a little girl in a soft blue nightgown pulling herself determinedly over the window sill with one hand, the other around a bright yellow plastic cup. He stared at her, motionless, not sure if he hadn't finally cracked and was hallucinating. She moved with the deliberate movements of a child determined not to drop what they were carrying, but the swing of her leg over the sill was practiced.

As she pulled a plush looking yet violently orange blanket after her, Dick took a second to look around and take in what he had missed so far. Half the fire escape was covered in an old rug, which in turn had a few worn out toys scattered on it. Obviously a play area, covered to protect little feet from rust and sharp metal.

She walked fearlessly towards him, stopping at the edge of the old rug, only about a two feet from where he kneeled.  
>"Mr. Nightwing, sir?" she asked, her voice quiet and soft. She couldn't have been more than 9 or 10, frizzy black hair a messy halo and blue eyes striking against dark skin. She held out the yellow cup. "Would you like some milk?"<p>

Nightwing just looked at her, the blank lenses of his mask shining dimly in the yellowed light coming down the alley from the street. It was a sight that had sent criminals and honest folk scrambling in fear for years, but she just looked at him calmly. Dick tried to hold in slightly cracked laughter.

Of all the fire escapes in all the world, he landed on hers.

She was always so self-possessed, little Allie Chambers. She crouched with well remembered grace and extended her hand further towards him.  
>He reached out instinctively and took the cup from her, fighting down memories of the last time he had seen her, not calm at all, screaming and fighting against him, reaching back as he pulled her away from the body of her mother. Seven years old and screaming for a mother who would never answer.<p>

"Mommy always used to make me warm milk when I couldn't sleep." She informed him, and he flinched. Confronted with another failure, another example of all the ways he'd never be good enough, fast enough, strong enough to protect everyone. He'd been too late to stop the robber from shooting Deena Chambers in their little New York apartment. He had just managed to snatch Allie from the path of the second bullet when the robber decided to stop her screaming permanently. He'd had some trouble digging it out of his shoulder later where the close-range shot had penetrated his body armor, but it had been worth it to save one of his favorite students, even if he'd failed to save her mother.

She'd been coming to the gymnastics studio he'd been teaching at for months, had shown so much promise, and then her life had fallen apart because he'd been too slow. He hadn't even known she had moved to Bludhaven, just that she had stopped coming to class.

"Mr. Nightwing, sir? Don't you like milk?" He focused on her again, in front of him, rather than past her, and reflexively took a sip. It tasted like ashes, but it was cold and felt good in his throat.

"Thank you," He rasped out, and was appalled at how gravely his voice was.

God, he was tired.

"Mama used to warm it, but I'm not allowed to use the microwave without supervision." Allie informed him, sinking down to sit cross-legged at the edge of the rug, pulling the blanket around her shoulders to ward off the night's chill. "Aunty says it's not safe, though Uncle tells her I'm responsible enough not to burn the house down. I don't know why I'd want to though; all my stuff is in here."

A rusty sound emerged from Dick's throat.

Too pathetic to be called a laugh, but there was humor in there somewhere.

"I think your Aunt is more worried about your safety." Dick said, his instincts finally pinging sluggishly over the fact that this little girl had come out here by herself. "Where are your Aunt and Uncle?"

Had they left her here alone?

"Aunty had to go to work." Allie told him seriously, pointing imperiously at the glass he still held, mostly full. "Drink, please."  
>Nightwing obediently took a sip, used to obeying imperious small children, though it had been far too long since he had gotten to spend much time with Lian.<p>

"The hospital called her and she had to go. She locked all the doors, and left the number for Mr. Anton across the hall if there was an emergency." Dick wanted to protest that someone on their fire-escape was an emergency, but she just kept talking. "Uncle is still asleep. He didn't hear you fall like I did. He had to take the pain pills for his arm, since he broke it, and now he's sleeping. He doesn't hear very well anymore anyway. Aunty says we're not supposed to shout at him though, because it's rude. Even to get him to hear us."

Nightwing nodded along with her. Of all the neighborhoods in Bludhaven, this was one of the safest. It still wasn't ideal to leave the child home without an able-bodied adult in the house. Then again when he'd been her age he'd been performing on the trapeze, and only a couple years older he'd been fighting crime on the streets of Gotham. So really, this was practically locking her up in a convent. She was safe enough. Except for confronting vigilantes on her fire-escape with cups of milk.

"You know it wasn't safe to come out here like this, right?" He had to ask her, had to make sure she didn't make a habit of putting herself in danger. "You couldn't have known what made all that noise. I could have been a bad guy."

She gave him that particular look that Lian had as well. The one that practically screamed that all boys and adults - especially boy adults - were too stupid to live.

"Of *course* you weren't going to hurt me." She said plainly, a hint of imperious exasperation in her voice. "You saved my life."

Dick had to clench his eyes shut behind his lenses, unable to take the sincerity, the simple truth of those words.

"I couldn't save your mom," the words were almost ripped from him.  
>He didn't mean to say them, didn't mean to drag out the pain. He didn't need absolution from this girl, didn't need to know that someone didn't blame him the way he blamed himself, didn't need her to tell him that he'd made a difference. But he wanted it. Oh, how he wanted it.<p>

She was silent for a long minute, and Dick felt himself tensing again. He put down the nearly empty cup and clenched his hands on his knees, head bowing, feeling like a supplicant to a whimsical goddess.

"I wish you could have. I miss her. But you also saved me, and I like living with Aunty and Uncle, even though I miss Mama. Aunty says Mama would be glad I was okay, and I think she's right." The words were like a blow from Superman and a hug from Kory in the same breath. Painful beyond imagining, but also so very welcome; warmth soothing old hurts.

They sat in silence for another long moment, before Allie spoke again. "You have to drink it all. It's rude not to finish it."

Another rusty laugh escaped him and Dick drained the cup, and saluted her with a flourish, setting it down again next to her. She picked it up as she stood, heedless of the rumples and dirt she had gotten on her pretty nightgown and soft blanket.

"Now you have to go to bed." She told him, and Dick had to wonder why he was letting this tiny slip of a girl dictate to him, when he barely even let Batman do so. "That's how it works. You drink the milk, and talk, and then you go back to bed and sleep until morning."

"I have to go back to work." He reminded himself as well as her. Those drug dealers had probably already completed their deal and melted back into the general filth of Bludhaven, but he might still be able to track them down, or make another circuit of the city and see if anyone else needed help.

She put her cup on the window ledge and put her hands on her hips, looking down her nose at him where he still kneeled on rusting metal. "No. You look like Papa did before he got sick and didn't get better. Mama told him to sleep more, and he didn't and then he died. I don't want you to die, so you are going to go to bed."

Well. There really wasn't any arguing with that, was there? Not coming from that earnest, serious little face.

Not when it was what he really wanted as well. Even the thought of being in his own bed for the whole four hours he might manage if he went home immediately sounded like heaven.

He dragged himself to his feet and took a couple steps towards her. She stared up at him, fearless even now that he towered over her. He went to one knee before her and gently took her hand.

"Thank you, little princess" He said, with all the sincerity he could muster for everything he couldn't put into words. He kissed her hand, and she giggled at him. "It's also time for all little princesses to be safely in their beds. I'll go find mine, if you promise me not to go looking for any more strange noises by yourself."

She looked at him suspiciously for a moment, before smiling brightly. "How am I supposed to know what it is if I don't go look? I promise only to come outside it's you though, if you promise to go straight to bed."

Dick had laughed more this night than he had as far back as he cared to consider. He shook her hand once, firmly like he was closing a business deal.

He'd have to watch out for this one. She was going to make something of herself, and it was going to be spectacular.

"I promise," he told her. "Now get on back to your own bed."

He saw her safely back inside, and made sure she locked the latch on the window. She made a shooing motion with her hands, and he gave a cheeky bow before diving in to a showy backflip over the railing, swinging back up and onto the roof.

He hesitated for a second, almost heading back the direction he had been going. But no. He had promised. He turned towards his apartment and headed out over the rooftop towards his own bed, picturing little Allie tucking herself back into her own behind him.

She was still alive because of him. Still around to play with toys and boss around everyone around her, and accost strange vigilantes with milk. She would grow up, and unless he greatly missed his mark for the second time that night, she would be someone fantastic.

He had done that. That was something to take, something to hold against the darkness and the seemingly hopeless city he had chosen.

Something to follow him into a hopefully peaceful sleep.

~~~

Slade watched the Kid head in the direction of his little apartment building through the scope of his rifle. Looked like the little girl had more sense than the hero, and had somehow managed to impress a little into the reckless boy. He unloaded the darts from his gun and packed the rifle away. He had missed his opportunity tonight. Had in fact not been needed. This outcome was actually preferable in the short-run than his solution.

Even though the Kid had denied his many offers of apprenticeship that didn't mean he was going to let the boy kill himself through exhaustion as he strove to please that bastard in Gotham.

Not even if Slade had to kidnap the stubborn, bull-headed hero to make it happen. He had to go investigate what HIVE was up to, but when he got back, if he found out the bird was still running himself into the ground and not sleeping he was going to have to take drastic measures, even if it got him a Bat on his ass.

For Joey, not to mention for the rest of their long history together, he wasn't going to let the hero get himself killed over something stupid like this.

This was obviously not a long-term solution, but Slade was satisfied that at least for the night Dick wasn't going to let exhaustion get him killed.


End file.
